Enough Is Enough!!!

TS2Prototype... this name came from since TSW: CSX Heavy Haul, short for TS(Two)Prototype, but precisely TS To Prototype.

 

I wouldn't expect anything other than the continued 5,6,7 etc. versions for years to come. They've hitched themselves to this pig of a mess and somehow swindled Focus into bankrolling it. They have no incentive to change since there always seems to be a certain threshold of whales who continue to buy up everything like Kirby at the dinner table. Unless Focus was giving them cash to build a whole new game? Even if it was the case, wouldn't you think twice about buying something else from this company at this point?

 

One of the issues with the current TSW is that DLC seems to take ages to make. That's not a good way to make money. We constantly hear excuses that it's difficult etc but 7 years in they should be almost production line like and instead it's recycled assets and often poor sounds with new ones. People do keep buying new stuff. I was one about 5 years ago and have stopped now and it's sales only or exceptions like Blackpool which is well above usual TSW standards.

People want new trains and this simulation as its stands barely delivers this. That can't be good for the accounts department.

 

Introducing the Pacer was the single most exciting thing since September - I don't hear great rejoicing about the new locos introduced at the launch. In fact I can't find any detailed reviews of Antelope Valley or the loco except to say it's "ok."

 

It feels like DTG are massively out of touch. Where is the 37/4, 56, 60? All three would appeal to all eras. No UK AC locos at all? No Settle and Carlisle or Fort William to Mallaig? Spirit of Steam for me is ruined by the lack of AI sounds but this barely gets acknowledged. One ghost town route after another. The whole BR stuff doesn't sell policy leaving a drought of releases from that era until JT step in and produce a hit.

We all want DTG to improve even those who have the harshest critical comments. Otherwise why are we here?

 

You are quite correct.

Where is Wales, something in Gwent and Glamorgan before the industry went away? Or my favourite hobbyhorse, the Yorkshire coalfield and power hub in the early 90's. It's as if they have lost their mojo and innovation when it comes to grabbing iconic projects and I fear they no longer have the talent or skill on staff or outsourced to do classic UK diesel stuff. Otherwise surely to god by now we would should have a Sulzer Type 2, Class 50, Deltic, Class 56 and Class 60. But instead we get yet another one handled EMU accompanied by yet another version of the Class 66.

Same thing applies across the board too... Where are the other European countries apart from Germany and a token Austria and Swiss presence (the latter only due to Rivet and their try hard, don't always succeed projects)? One high speed route from France, nothing classic with Corail coaches and those distinctie diesel and electric locos hauling long distance trains. Belgium or the Netherlands, crying out to be represented.

There's an ongoing discussion about what the next US route should be, but in that case I have to say Railroader is showing one direction in which they should go. Not just another A to B up and downhill run or commuter haul.

 

Its funny because a while ago I remember Matt saying he wanted to dig fewer but deeper holes in terms of content. I know we haven't seen what DTGS proper offerings are yet really but I hope they'll start to do some of that with their new content.

 

Depends on licensing to do other parts of the uk and Europe

 

That excuse starts to wear thin. Have they even asked? Are we saying every other European railway organisation other than DB, OBB, SBB and Rhb are not prepared to entertain being in a sim.? And they obviously have a licence for SNCF or we wouldn't have got LGV. There's enough material in France alone to keep routes coming for years.

As regards the UK, well 90's South Wales or Yorkshire is still BR times so no issue there either.

 

I disagree that TSW should go the path of Railroader. This programs fill two totally different categories. Railroader is more like a tactical resource management simulation in which the driving of the consist is secondary to the main focus of the simulation. They have a great start and I look forward to the continued development and am enjoying the game, but do get a bit turned off from the management aspect after a while.

TSW is more of a set piece where the driving of the consist is the focus. Just like TSC, each scenario is a complete experience in and of itself, such that you can dedicate what limited time you have to drive to a scenario or timetable that matches that time and feel you have finished something. The timetable mode does add some continuity to those who want to follow a service through out the day, and journey mode attempts to provide some sense of a path to the choices available.

I think both have merit and would not like to see either meld toward the others approach but hope both continue to improve in their own directions.

As an analogy, in MSFS 2020, you have the choice to fly any aircraft anywhere in the world. You don’t have to worry about qualifications, material resources et cetera. You just fly. There are add ons like air hauler, Pilots life 2, Neofly that adds the resource/qualification aspects to the simulation..

 

Matt has explained how some operators have no interest to be in tsw. Some don't allow dtg to get access to reference material. Licensing isn't easy. Dtg also can't do all the other countries. 3rd parties have to fill the gap when dtg is releasing a lot already.

 

Every route we've had requires a license, we got those didn't we.

Bringing up the topic of licensing everytime a new route or train operator is mentioned is pointless; we all know one is needed.

 

Well to do other routes outside of what we got, the license may or may not be possible and that determines if it can be made in the era or at all. I'm still waiting on my local route and dtg don't have a license and I don't think they would ever get a license

 

What don't you understand?

It is pointless bringing up the argument of no license.

For one, unless you are involved with that sort of thing, you wouldn't know, especially if DTG do not employ you.

For two, everyone here knows a license is needed and that it may not be possible.

The point is: the fact there is no license means nothing unless it can't be obtained for whatever reason. It does not mean we can't discuss it either.

 

Thing is, a licence is rarely a coverall or lifetime agreement.

 

So gotta ask, since they abandoned tsw2 have they now done the same with TSW3? Or is it another "Fixes are coming but we HAVE TO PUT THEM IN TSW4 FIRST"

 

They're coming.

 

I remember them saying this about tsw2. A year they had us waiting, a year and then they just cancelled it because tsw2 wasent important anymore.

 

This time the're definitely coming.

 

I'm not so sure about that. Admittedly, I'm only guessing but I'd have thought that the priority of any developer would be to make their content appealing to as many people as possible...and because not everyone gets on with steam, a route like Settle > Carlisle wouldn't really be categorised as having that broader level of appeal.
Take Peak Forest for example: I live less than 30 minutes away from Matlock and visit Millers Dale multiple times a year, but because it's a steam route I had absolutely no desire to want to purchase it.

I do kind of sympathise with DTG where route choice is concerned because everyone wants something different and it must be quite difficult to find the correct balance in order to satisfy as many people as is humanly possible. Granted, sub-standard releases don't really help things but even so, if they were developed to the same levels as Blackpool Branches would it really have made all those routes a better proposition? I suspect not because if you can't relate to what you're playing or (in the case of steam routes) you don't have that initial level of interest then they will always be categorised as a non-compulsory purchase for collection purposes only.
Tharandter Rampe being the perfect example. An exceptionally high quality add-on that's arguably of a much higher standard than Blackpool Branches, but because it didn't have those universal levels of appeal it's barely even mentioned nowadays.

 

This comment seems to be in conflict with itself.
There is an old saying in business: "You can have it good, fast, or cheap. Pick any two." It hardly makes sense to say that DTG should be churning out more routes faster, but at the same time stop using shortcuts like recycled assets.

 

Thing is, in TSC we have had a lot of countries and different eras and rolling stock etc with different suppliers in the process. My point was 7 years on things should be coming out a little more often and be a bit more interesting than huge empty stations that took months to build. There must be some art people who wonder why they bothered seeing creations devoid of anything. I take the license issue to a certain point but that is no way the crux of the problem. Is all the bugs down to licencing?

People have had enough of the mind changing, the new versions that nothing seems to improve on. The lack of interesting content. The feeling that routes are produced and forgotten about. No way now will I pay £30.00 for something that I will get bored with after an hour. Sorry but that isn't good enough.

 

Point is something becomes more efficient after time not the quality worsens or stays poor after time.

 

Not sure Tharandter Ramp is better than Blackpool but the Ramp is good I will give it that. The point is Settle and Carlisle is an Icon. Not saying everyone would enjoy it. Flying Scotsman is an icon but it's took almost 7 years for it to come out. MSTS had Flying Scotsman on the full length of the S and C on day one.

 

The Ramp was good, but mainly because of the 612 otherwise I had never heard of it before. When I think of iconic Germany, I tend to go with the Rhine Valley (which is not to the standard of The Ramp), the route through the Black Forest to Stuttgart or Innsbruck to Garmisch. From Zusi days, the Obereruhrtalbahn, the now closed Schunterbahn between Wolfsburg and Braunschweig or their classic route out of Altenbeken. Not Maintalbahn, done to a very low standard.

 

The first round of patches already came to tsw3. The patches will come in multiple parts

 

Some people are remarkably confident, despite our shared experience, that history won't repeat itself.

Inside knowledge? Or simply the usual apologists.

 

Until proven otherwise, I'll say they are. Although I probably shouldn't count my chickens before they hatch.

 

November 27: there was an update to tsw3 that fixed some scenarios across different routes. In that same announcement they explained more patches are releasing.

 

To be fair after being harsh the roadmap has some positive points. That being Peak Forest and WSR will have some life put into them! 104 dmu is happening which is great.

 

Yes but the Editor is still left in the dark...........

 

Very happy with the roadmap (and not just because I got a shoutout). I love peak forest, so that getting some love is very welcome. WSR is a complete surprise, and will be great with an added steam timetable.

What's your issue with the editor? It can build routes and timetables fine currently. Can even package/cook files with the community work around.

 

Eh............ it shouldn't rely on the community to do the fixes for them!!

 

No, but it still works. so it isn't a blocker/big issue.

 

They put out one set and some have mentioned it broke things. Will they bother fixing it in the 2nd (and final) set of fixes or just abandon as was the practice with TSW2 because "it's old"? Time will tell. But judging by past performance you'd be correct to err on the side of caution with these folks and don't get your hopes up.

 

Agreed

 

Funny, it seems like they saw my writing and ideology about continuing to sell every version of TSW.
https://forums.dovetailgames.com/threads/enough-is-enough.72535/page-43#post-748026

"They could have continued to sell all TSW with no impact, even without providing more support, that's called stupidity."

Sales of all previous TSW have resumed, with the exception of TSW 2020.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1282590/Train_Sim_World_2/
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1944790/Train_Sim_World_3/

https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/p/train-sim-world-2
https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/p/train-sim-world-3

https://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/store/train-sim-world-2/9PBB13RDD77Z/0010
https://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/store/train-sim-world-3-standard-edition/9PN99PX1P1LX/0010

 

Nice, selling dead games again, their should be a hint "Support ended, please buy the current iteration to get support".

I mean, even if you would open up a ticket for some TSW2 stuff, you would never get any help besides "buy TSW4".

 

Like, there are literally tens of thousands of games on steam that no longer receive patches, but are for sale. Not sure why that would be an issue?

 

I still play old xbox games, one of which the company that made it went bankrupt. Doesn't affect my gameplay experience.

 

Same here, plenty of games I play that haven't had a patch in years, some even over a decade. Still fun to play, bugs and all.

 

OMSI 2 for one. It's a brilliant bus sim when you can get it working, but for me destined to only ever be playable with mouse or keyboard because the gamepad implementation is borked and the dev no longer maintains it. Most of the Aerosoft World Of Subways are the same. Still on sale, major bugs but not supported.

 

For Omsi 2, yes but 1. the core works 2. the majority of bugs are on the external content developers

 

The core of TSW also works.

 

Not in the way it should do to allow the game to be realistic

 

If it was broken that bad, it wouldn't work.

The game is realistic enough.

 

It is because it is DTG, who for some on here has become some kind of soap villain. Anyone else can do it but DTG must be called to account by those who know best!

 

No it isnt theres features that arent in the game due to the 'core'

 

Proof of Life

 

Unfortunately some can't see the difference between DTG having an acceptable standard that differs to theirs. Ultimately we are not forced to buy anything and there is a refund option on Steam which I have used as have others. If the train goes and stops and there is some scenery then a route will get released..if the sounds are wrong or PIS is not working or a square mile of scenery was done on a Friday afternoon before the weekend that is often seen as acceptable. The JT route that came out recently and TSGs work is generally better. Labelling a business that works to a certain standard in an extremely negative way isn't really fair when the sales stack up. Pushing DTG to improve certain things in a constructive way is a far better way to tackle issues.